Destined To Lead Edgar Rudolph Pund 1894 –1975 • Destined To Lead Edgar Rudolph Pund 1894 –1975 • Dedicated Physician & President of the Medical College of Georgia A. Bleakley Chandler, M. D. new oconee press Watkinsville, Georgia 2019 Published 2019 by New Oconee Press Watkinsville, Georgia © 2019 by Arthur Bleakley Chandler All rights reserved Text design by Erin Kirk New Set in 11 on 16 Adobe Minion Printed and bound by Bookmobile The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources. Printed in the United States of America 20 21 22 23 c 4 3 2 1 isbn: 978-0-578-54453-3 A doctor above all should be the servant of all, But the hireling of none. edgar r. pund 1955 Proceedings of the Medical College of Georgia, Vol.3, No.1: 20–30, 1955 contents Foreword ix Introduction and Acknowledgements xiii v chapter one Early Professional Life, 1914–1931 1 chapter tw0 Department Head, 1931–1953 11 chapter three Scientific Studies, 1928–1954 23 chapter four President Pund, 1953–1958 43 v appendix Evolution of Eugene Talmadge Memorial Hospital Operational Policies 59 foreword edgar rudolph pund was a member of the third generation of his family in Augusta. The Pund family came to this country as part of the migration of Germans in the 1840s and 50s. His grandparents were all immigrants. His pater- nal grandfather Henry, born in 1833 in Hanover, came to the US from Bremen, while his paternal grandmother Amalia Kneckmeyer was born in July of 1836 in Calau and arriving in Augusta in 1854. They married in Augusta on November 8, 1857. Henry was a shoe and boot maker. He and Amalia had three children including Charles Theodore born in January of 1859, daughter Catharine born in 1861, and Edgar’s father Henry Rudolph, born December 11, 1862, four months after the death of his twenty-eight-year-old father in August of 1862. Amalia raised her children on her own in downtown Augusta. Charles T. had become a grocer while his younger brother Henry Rudolph worked as a clerk in his store. With her children grown, Amalia remarried on November 23, 1884, to widower George Evers. Like Henry Pund and his wife, George Evers and his first wife were immigrants, George from Germany and wife Anna Marie Mast Evers, who arrived from the Alsace-Lorraine area, long disputed by France and Germany. It is likely that she was German-speaking. George became a very successful baker in Augusta and he and his wife had several children, including daughter Louisa Fredericka, born 1865. In 1880 fifteen-year-old Fredericka Evers was living with her parents and siblings in the 100 block of Center Street. Then tragedy struck when her mother died on Augusta 22 that year at only fifty-eight years old. The Punds and Evers had undoubtedly known each other for years. The German-American community of Augusta was close, drawn together by lan- guage and culture, and by St. Matthews Lutheran Church, which conducted all services in German. So in 1888, four years after his mother Amalia had married ix x foreword George Evers, Henry Rudolph Pund married Louisa Fredericka Evers, his step- sister. Henry made his career with his brother in the grocery business, while he and Fredericka raised a family. Rhetta came first in October 1889, followed by Louise in June 1892, Edgar Rudoph in June 1894, Harry C. in September 1896, and Herbert C. in 1899, the familiar stair-step birth pattern of the late nineteenth century. Edgar Rudolph Pund grew up in downtown Augusta in the midst of his German American aunts and uncles, cousins, siblings and step-siblings. The Augusta in which he came of age was a city working to modernize. After the Civil War, the city enlarged the canal, making it possible for several large textile mills to rise on its banks, attracting hundreds in from the countryside to make cloth. The downtown, where the Punds lived, was the vibrant commercial center of the region and an increasingly diverse area as a new immigration from south and east Europe contributed to the cultural and economic milieu, adding Italian, Greek, Russian, and other languages on Augusta’s streets. By the time Edgar was born, the Bon Air Hotel had topped the “Hill” where he would live as an adult, and wealthy Northerners were coming for the “season” to enjoy the mild win- ters and the golf links. In the early twentieth century, many winter visitors were building mansions in Summerville for their seasonal stays on the Hill. When Pund was in his teens, the first plane had flown over the town and the Wright brothers had founded a school in Augusta. It was in this atmosphere that Edgar received his education. In June 1907 eleven cadets at the Academy of Richmond County, then still on Telfair Street next door to the Medical College of Georgia, got diplomas. At the head of the class was George Lombard Kelly, who received the medal for general excellence. Other graduates to play major roles in Augusta were E. A. Bleakley [uncle of author A. Bleakley Chandler], Norman I. Boatwright, Frank A. Calhoun, and Harry Vaiden. Receiving an honorable mention in the freshman class that year was young Edgar Pund. Active in the YMCA that year, Edgar was a member of the “Whoop Em Ups” membership team. When he graduated from ARC three years later in June 1911, he was 1st Lieutenant Pund and author of his class history. His parents hosted a “beautiful supper party” at their home for Edgar and his classmates, according to the Augusta Chronicle. In a program at the YMCA that foreword xi fall he performed a piano duet with his sister Louise as well as a violin solo. He had musical ability which he enjoyed throughout his years. The Punds were active members of the St. Matthews Lutheran Church and surrounded by the other families of German heritage who were part of it. In 1913, older sister Rhetta married Frank Stelling in the church while her brothers Edgar and Harry C. served as attendants for the groom. The Stellings had also been an immigrant family in the major migration. Many of the children and even grand- children of those first Germany immigrants married within the German com- munity. Throughout his life, Edgar Pund was active in his church and the Luther League, sometimes acting as a speaker for devotional meetings. He represented Lutherans on the Sunday School Athletic Association formed under the auspices of the YMCA. So Edgar Pund’s childhood was filled with family, church, educa- tion, and community. This biography that follows has been meticulously researched and written by Dr. Arthur Bleakley Chandler, for whom Dr. Pund was a beloved mentor, and whom Dr. Pund considered as a son. Both Dr. Chandler and his wife Jane felt that the Punds treated them as family. Jane remembered meeting Edgar and Susan Pund shortly her engagement. She remembered Dr. Pund fondly. What follows is an excerpt of a remembrance the late Jane D. Chandler wrote that gives a more personal side of Dr. Pund: When Bleakley and I got engaged and he brought me to Augusta to meet his family, the first thing he did was introduce me to Dr. Pund. Bleakley told me Dr. Pund had been his mentor and was a very important part of his life. He had just been made president of the medical college. We went to Dr. Pund’s house and he welcomed us and was extremely nice—not scary like I had expected. Thanksgiving was just around the corner and the Punds had us for dinner. The dinner was overwhelming—we had everything possible to eat—a huge dinner but I couldn’t eat a bite. The Punds’ house was next to the house where the Markwalters lived. The Markwalters were part of the Lutheran Church group that the Punds were part of. A little house in the Markwalters back yard was known as the breeding house where young people always went to live when they first got married. xii foreword Pund was many things—He was active, kind, and always wanted his own family. He had an adopted son, but adopted Bleakley and me because we were a couple. He was Godfather to our youngest son and took on our family as his own. He retired in 1958 and a few years later moved to his wife’s home town of Seneca S. C. He and Mrs. Pund (they wanted us to call them Susan and Edgar but somehow we couldn’t) came to spend the night with us from time to time. We lived two blocks from the school and Dr. Pund whose right eye had gotten worse (he wore a patch over one eye and could hardly see) insisted on driving our boys to school when it was raining. He did this by bumping along the curb so he would know where he was. Our boys were not very happy with this arrangement and said to us, “We would rather get soaking wet than have to go to school by bumping along the curb.” When Dr. Pund got older we ended up having to rescue him many times. We became the parents and he became the child. He would try to drive himself to Augusta to visit us and we ended up taking him back home with someone meeting us halfway to finish the job. Dr. Pund was a very important part of our life and we were very grateful to him for having played this role.